They're here, the thought set adrenaline singing through her veins.
The sulfurous cloud engulfed them in moments, there wasn't time to react.
It burned.
It felt like her face was on fire, her nose, her eyes burned and blurred before darkness.
Had she closed them?
She wanted away.
Everyone!
Gisela forced her eyes open.
Everything was blurred. Tears.
Something impacted her side. Sharp pain radiated out.
Gisela lashed out blinding. She need to recover. It felt like something was blurring.
She dashed her hand across her eyes. The tears cleared a little. The was a clear space around her.
She could feel the magic. The realization hit her like a lighting bolt. These are clouds.
It was harder than controlling her own clouds, but they were clouds. Even if they were clouds of fart.
You. Are. Mine!
She forced them away, revealing the caravan- it still looked intact and movement in the corner of her eye.
Gisela spun, dodging out of the way of the second kick, her side aching. "Kagura". She had no more breath after that.
His butt was to her again.
This time she had a plan.
The second she felt the cloud leave his control she took it to hers. Not allowing it to move. Gas did interesting things when it was charged.
The bang shook the trees, sending a stream of sulfurous air off to the side. Gisela ducked out of the foul beam.
The guy rocketed into a tree hard enough that the tree fell down. The sulfur swirled around, slowly diluting into the air.
Gisela still smelled it. She tried to breathe shallowly, limiting her noses exposure to the unpleasant air.
Whose idea had been fart magic and why had it been allowed?
Then she got back to work, trying to figure out what to do.
Gisela hesitated for a moment. Should I check on them. She didn't know where Kagura was, didn't know if everyone was okay.
She needed to help.
Looks like my magic is good at something. Gisela thought wildly as she moved, heart thudding in her ears.
This was real.
There!
It almost looked like a dance, one guy would pause, trying to charge up while the other one went at Kagura.
Someone would slam to the ground, just not hard enough.
Don't mess with a good thing? Gisela was about to interfere when a beam of light shot out of the bushes, hitting the sitting duck.
It wasn't her light.
It wasn't Kagura's either.
Her forearms started to itch. A reminder of the last light mage she had fought.
"Come out", Kagura ordered harshly, her sword held at the ready.
"We come in peace", a calm voice called out. Looking in the direction of the voice Gisela could see a figure coming.
Two figures.
"Is everyone alright?", the other one called.
"We're fine", Kagura snapped back. Distantly Gisela noticed that Kagura was favoring her right side a bit.
Gisela hoped Kagura was okay. She watched the two women carefully, magic ready for action.
They had helped against the Jiggle Butt Gang.
That didn't make them safe.
"Celia", Gisela carefully didn't whorl back at Lana's high, nasally voice.
"Lana", the first voice called, "we were wondering when your caravan was going to get here. I assume those two ready to fight us are your guards".
"Exactly, glad you could make it". Glancing back Gisela could see Lana covering her nose. She sympathized.
Her clouds had dispersed most of the stink but most wasn't all.
Gisela took Kagura sheathing her sword as a cue to release her own magic. Her legs felt oldly shaky.
She wouldn't let herself collapse, not now.
"Good work", Kagura said quietly.
"You too". She hoped Kagura would take it for what is was. Even so, the battle ending reminded her of her unfinished business. "What do we do with the gang?". She really didn't know, the one guy was knocked out, she could see the bark patterns on his face and he seemed non reactive.
"This is the last one"
"Drag him over", one of the two women, Gisela was pretty sure she was the light mage, called, "we can get the rune knights to pick them up".
"Kay". It was either said than done, excluding the… large posterior the Jiggle Butt was a large man and she was a fifteen year old, magic user or not.
Magic user. Gisela could have smacked herself. Do I really want to pollute my clouds like this?
She huffed, trying to control the coughing that came with the sulfur. Bad idea. Just get this over with.
Carefully she wrapped the man in clouds, dropping him off with the other two.
Everyone had congregated in a group.
"Coming through", she warned, guiding her burden. A thought struck her, "is that everyone? Or are there more to the Jiggle Butt gang". She hoped not, that would suck.
"I think so", the second women offered. Really, she was more of a girl a little more than Gisela's apparent age. "I really don't want to deal with the smell, you want some perfume? I grabbed some when I heard we were going after them".
"That was a good thought".
"I know. I'm Aira by the way. Here ya go".
"Thanks". Gisela caught the bottle.
It wasn't a bottle.
It was a lacrima?
"You channel your magic thought it".
Gisela flushed. Was it that obvious?
She reached, not for the clouds that she was so used to but for her raw magic. It lept at her command, so different from when she first called it.
The air was filled with a strong sense of roses. Normally Gisela wasn't so fond of overflowing flower scents but in this case she would take it and take it happily.
"Good idea". The older women smiled at both of them. "That was nice work with the cloud magic", she looked at Kagura, "are you a mage too?".
"Gravity".
"Would you consider working with us sometime? I have heard that gravity and light have very interesting interactions".
"Maybe. You work in magi-science?"
"I dabble".
"Celia's awesome!", Aira cheered brightly, "she even got to work on the new light pens, they stay for much longer now and have some super cool functions".
Ceila shrugged modestly. "I have sent word to the knights, all we can do is keep watch now". She switched her attention back to Kagura, "please consider our request".
Kagura nodded, the conversation paused for a moment before she asked, "are you two part of a guild".
"We're part of Unicorns Mane. The best guild in these parts", Aira said firmly. Now that Gisela was looking she could see a yellow mark like a lock of hair wrapped around the girl's wrist.
She could tell from Aira's tone that the girl was just daring them to say anything bad about her guild. Gisela glanced at Celia. The women just smiled.
Gisela didn't feel like getting into a fight, even if she had had points to argue. There was nothing she could say.
All they could do was watch the bodies and wait.
They then proceeded to stand around awkwardly staring at a bunch of beaten, passed out guys. Well, Lana was doing fine- as were they twins who had apparently met these people before.
Gisela on the other hand hadn't. And that meant it was awkward.
So she started for watching. "That one's twitching". She pointed out the one that Celia had his, the guys hair was still smoking.
Celia looked over, "good catch".
Gisela braced herself, wondering how the older women would react.
She slapped a piece of paper on the Jiggle Butt. Then she slapped on on the other two. Afterwards she shook out her hand. "Remind me to wash this, I really don't want to know where they've been".
"Are you sure?", Aira asked. Gisela could hear the teasing note in her voice. What was Aira doing?
Ceila just rolled her eyes. "Don't test me", she warned.
"Fine", Aira replied, drawing out the word like she was a child.
Thankfully she stopped after that, Gisela felt herself relax. She didn't know what she would have done if they started fighting.
She needed a distraction, "what were those papers?", she questions, genturing to the scrapes.
"Sleep runes, they don't work so well when the mage is awake and can resist but they come in handy afterwards."
"Cool".
It was back to silence. Gisela saw Aki creeping over, she shook her head quietly.
Aki just smirked. Gisela was debating what to do when she saw the people on the horizon. She was about to call up her magic when she heard Ceila, "took you guys long enough, we were getting bored over here".
A group of Rune Knights came tromping down the road, their white robes dusty. "It's not our fault you decided to go through the brush", one of them called out. He was quickly silenced by the man in the lead.
"These are the Jiggle Butts?", he asked.
"Can't you tell from the smell", Aira asked snarkily. Gisela found herself wincing again, she really didn't want Aira to get in trouble.
The Rune Knight in charge seemed to sigh. "Load them into the carriage", he ordered.
Gisela moved out of the way to let the other Rune Knights pick up the passed out gang members. Part of her was amused that the guy in charge was not helping. Lucky him.
"Let me guess," Aira said, "you are now going to head off without paying us for our work".
"Aira", Ceila gasped, stepping in front of her. "I am sorry for my guild members rudeness, please accept her apology".
Aira huffed, rolling her eye catching golden eyes. "I'm sorry", she said.
Gisela watched the Knight warily. Aira shouldn't have said that, it didn't mean that she trusted the Knight's reaction.
"It's fine, I know children often speak out of turn".
Ouch. Gisela saw the look that passed between the two guild mages. Thankfully Aira didn't say anything else.
After that Gisela was just glad to see the Knights move out, heading back to the nearest outpost to procese the gang.
It was all she could do to keep her sigh of relief inaudible. She didn't want to let on how stressful that whole thing had been.
Time moved oddly after that as they got back into the carriage. Gisela went back to her seat in the back.
This time she couldn't zone out. Even through logicly after a fight with a mage gang the odds of another was much lower she still felt her nerves vibrating like the strings on a guitar.
Even so through all that there was a tiny bit of pride. This time she hadn't frozen up.
They had lost time to the bandit raid but thankfully Pansy Town, the name that somebody had finally mentioned, was near enough.
Aiko and Aki had come by, begging for stories. Gisela had tried to make it sound interesting, it was hard.
The fight had just been a blur of stink and trying desperately for a plan. She was lucky that their magics interacted the way that they did.
Even through Gisela loved her clouds she sometimes wished she had a magic better for offense somehow.
Finally after around an hour they kids got bored and ran off to bother someone else.
"Don't forget to meditate", Gisela called afterthem. If they wanted to learn magic they were going to have to learn.
Sunset streaked across the sky, Gisela wondered if they were going to call a halt.
They didn't.
As it got dark Ceila called up ribbons of light that streamed around the carriage, Aira joining her, multicolored sprays and pure golden light.
It was beautiful.
It also pulled Gisela back into her thoughts about wishing her magic was stronger. She remembered Kagura mentioning something weird about light magic before.
Maybe I should ask. Ceila had been nice so far and she seemed willing to experiment with how magics interacted.
That was a point of leverage. IF Celia wanted to learn more about magic then it could be something to look into and not just Gisela bothering an adult who didn't want anything to do with her.
It was worth a shot. Hopefully Gisela didn't mess it up and ruin Lana and the rest of the caravan's relationship with the guild.
It will be okay. She told herself, trying to keep calm. She had already had one irrational freak out, she didn't need another.
The town was just a little farther up. It was odd, the day had left her kind of… floaty.
Less than six hours ago I was fighting a gang. She had to hold back the giggles, somehow it was just so funny. The pain, the fear, the everything. It was so distant.
Finally they got set up for the night.
Peaking through the back of the wagon Gisela saw Aki and Aiko curled up and fast asleep. She pulled back.
The night passed similarly, they had been put up behind the guild, just camping out like they had for the rest of the time.
She slept fitfully.
Gisela shivered in the early morning light. It had been chilly in Clover Town but the higher up they went, was that the term for it? Gisela really didn't know, the colder it got. Just because her magic made it easy for her to weather didn't mean it was nice.
Maybe I should change clothes…
Gisela still didn't want to. She sat, waiting until everyone had woken up. When she asked what the plan for the day was it turned out they were staying the day.
Apparently Lana had talked to Celia and she had some clients in Pansy Town she wanted to reconnect with.
Gisela and Kagura also had a free day.
"I'm going to the guild. I want to know if they know anything about the tower", Kagura said abruptly, as was her style. "Do you want to come to?"
Gisela felt unexpected warmth gather in her stomach, it was nice to be thought off. "I would like that. Do you think Celia would see if her magic interacts with mine. I remember you mentioned something about that".
"It is likely, she seemed interested how magics interact. I might do some testing of my own".
"It would be good, gravity is kind of screwy". Gisela really didn't know any other way to describe it.
Luckily there was no need to search for the guild, they were right behind it after all. The whole place seemed to shimmer in the morning light.
This is definitely a light mage guild. Gisela found herself thinking. It looks really different from the temple. She hadn't said her prayers since she left, not really. She wasn't sure if she was allowed… or even if she wanted too.
I'll deal with that later.
There was a man cleaning the bar, he looked up as they entered, seemingly alerted by an unseen alarm.
"Can I help you?", he asked briskly, "I'm pretty sure it's too early for a drink- especially for ladies as lovely as you two are".
There was a lump in Gisela's throat, she wasn't quite sure why but she just didn't want to take.
"We are looking for Celia?".
That seemed to get his attention. "What do you two need with the guild master".
"We came in with the caravan last night, she said that we should talk to her".
"Your names are…"
"Gisela and Kagura".
"Right then, I'll go see if she's awake".
Once he was gone up the stairs Gisela glanced around. The room was, unsurprisingly, well lit. There was no one else currently in- something that Gisela was grateful for, and she could see the board in the corner with job posting.
She was just debating if she should go over and look at it when Celia came back in. "I must admit, when I invited you two to come talk to us I didn't expect it to be quite so early".
"Sorry", Gisela said, right as Kagura spoke.
"We figured that we had a lot to do before the caravan left and wanted to make sure that we had time to do it".
"It's fine", Celia said with a relaxed shrug. "Aira will be sad if she misses you two. She's the youngest mage here and was rather excited to see people her own age around".
"Hopefully she will come in", Gisela debated with herself for a second before asking her question, "I didn't know you were the guild master, how many people are in this guild?".
Celia shrugged, "including Grant", she said gesturing to the bar keep, "we have ten people".
"Is that small for a guild?". Fairy Tail was much bigger than that- Gisela knew that much for sure.
"We're not a huge guild, we used to work with another guild, Cait Shelter, but they shut down recently. We have been a little strapped with just us but we make do. It's why I was out yesterday. We wanted to make sure that the Giggle Butts didn't get a hand hold here. Gangs are always more of a pain in the neck when they do". She paused for a moment, "anyways, what can I do for you two".
"I was wondering if you know anything about the Tower of Heaven", Kagura asked bluntly. "I'm looking for someone, his name is Simon and he is my brother".
Celia's face fell, "I'm sorry, all I know is what was in the news paper, is there anything else that I can help with".
Gisela could just make out the disappointment in Kagura's face. She wanted to hug the other girl or comfort her or something but the words would come out. All she could do was stand there. "You mentioned something about magic testing", she said, trying to change the subject.
That was something that she could do. She was good at evasion.
Celia light up. Literally. It burned at Gisela's eyes. "Too bright", she whimpered as she felt the tears leaking out of them for the second time in less than twenty four hours.
Gisela had the feeling that she would regret this.
Seven hours later of experimentation she was right.
Gisela had lost another chition to magic burn and even Kagura's pristine clothes were looking ashy.
Ceila had run them hard, it had only double when Aira had made it down later.
They both looked very scorched.
On the other hand Gisela had learned something valuable about her magic. Clouds could absorb things like beams of light.
Somehow.
Something about how the idea of a cloud was absorption and how this meant that instead of water her magic clouds could absorb magic.
It was actually pretty cool.
Celia thought so at least. The women had immediately started seemin just how much Gisela could take- thus leading to the scorch marks all over everything.
Rebounds sucked. So much.
Finally Gisela dropped, she felt thin and scraped, worked to the bone by Celia.
She felt something poking her. She turned over, shifting her hand from where it covered her eyes.
It was Aki.
"Ask Celia", she said before turning back over.
She didn't have to help pack for an hour. She could nap now.
In the background she heard someone laughing.